Hey reddit, I'm Dan Ariely, a behavioral economist, professor of psychology and author of Predictably Irrational, The Upside of Irrationality and The Honest Truth About Dishonesty.

I'm working on a documentary called (Dis)Honesty – The Truth About Lies, a fascinating look into the human tendency to be dishonest, from little white lies to infidelity and plagiarism. You can check out our Kickstarter here.

I heard an interview with you on NPR, promoting The Honest Truth about Dishonesty. It was interesting, so I purchased the book. That too was interesting, but in some parts it struck me as, I don't know, a bit quick on drawing conclusions (I want to be clear at this point that I don't mean any offense, and that in general I thought the book was good and thought provoking).

A specific example I can think of is in the chapter on the supposed relationship between creativity and dishonesty. In there, you describe an experiment that you performed in which people who described themselves, in a variety of ways, as being creative turned out to be more willing to cheat and lie in certain other ways.

Now, that's interesting. However, when you summarize the results, you don't say "now we know that people who describe themselves as creative are more willing to cheat and lie". Instead, you say "now we know that people who are creative are more willing to cheat and lie".

That seems like a very large difference to me, yet you glossed over it without even briefly acknowledging it. It seems problematic in and of itself on a purely semantic level, but even more so given that these people who are known to cheat and lie might have been more willing to cheat and lie about being creative, too.

I guess none of that was a question, so I guess my question is: What do you have to say about this?

Anyway, once again, I enjoyed the book, generally speaking. Thanks for writing it.

Sorry if this was not clear. In one experiment we measured creativity with the standard scales for creativity. In another experiment we mandated creativity -- which means that we primed people in a way that make them more creative for a few min and we measured their dishonesty during that time. In yet another experiment we measured the type of job that people had and the creativity requirements of that job.

So -- non of these experiments is perfect, and it is hard to measure dishonesty, but across all the experiments the pattern is the same and I feel confidence in the results.

This is my first day in Reddit -- so I am not sure how this works, so ia m sorry if I am posting this twice.

Sorry if this was not clear. In one experiment we measured creativity with the standard scales for creativity. In another experiment we mandated creativity -- which means that we primed people in a way that make them more creative for a few min and we measured their dishonesty during that time. In yet another experiment we measured the type of job that people had and the creativity requirements of that job.
So -- non of these experiments is perfect, and it is hard to measure dishonesty, but across all the experiments the pattern is the same and I feel confidence in the results.
I hope this is more clear now.
Best
Dan

If you had the opportunity to ask the government to change or institute a public policy based on your research, and they had to comply, what would you ask for? What would do the most for social welfare?

I would make taxes simple and more equitable. I also think that the complexity of the tax system makes it hard for people to remember what taxes are for, and not just see taxes as an adversarial relationship with the government

More generally, my studies on irrational behavior make me worry about people. In terms of dishonesty, I don't think I worry more than others. But now that you've pointed this out, maybe I should be concerned that people think I am more dishonest because I study dishonesty!

Probably the vaccination experiment -- they took a group of students and gave half of them information about the importance of vaccination, but also gave the other half directions to the health center and asked them to indicate a time in their calendars that they would show up. Amazingly, the information did very little but the map and schedule was very effective at getting people to show up and get vaccinated. For me, this is an important building block -- providing people with information is not very useful, and we need to change the environment to facilitate better decision-making.

There's a company that sends a very large letter. Not just kind of big, but HUGE. It's so out of the ordinary that people are much more likely to open it rather than toss it into their pile of spam letters.

Right now we have a new study on bribery, we are also looking at how physicians break bad news to patients, we are trying to get poor people in Kenya to save a bit of money for rainy days, and if I tell you the rest I might have to kill you

Preventative care is all about people doing the right thing way in advance, before the medical system can catch what's going on. This is the place where behavioral interventions are most likely to have the highest impact.

Hey Dan, do you believe people are selfish rather than altruistic? (not sure how to ask this as not to suggest an answer).
Is it meaningful to ask this question and to what extent do you believe this has to do with the threat of punishment rather than trying to act in accordance with moral principle?

I believe that people are deeply altruistic, and selfishness comes later. One piece of evidence for this is that we have some data showing that when people are drunk, they react more extremely to injustice -- even at a cost to themselves

In your book Predictably Irrational, you talk about the difference between social and market norms.

I recently found myself in a situation where a friend of my friend was picking me and my friend up from the airport and I didn't know if I should pay him or if it would just be considered a favor. I ended up giving him money. Do you think there is a better option in situations like these?

Perhaps I should have given him a gift? "While gifts are financial inefficient, they are an important social lubricant."

So amazing you are doing this, I'm a huge fan! Will take a shot for an answer:

Some people tend to have an imaginary world where they escape that sometimes makes them completely uninterested in their own lives (see how popular TV & movies world is). Is this behavior considered socially acceptable or have there been some studies regarding the general profile of an individual that has this sort of inner fantasy world? Is this how humans lie to their conscience to cope better with day to day life or is it just a form of the Peter Pan syndrome?

Dan, have you heard about the phrase "Don't ask what you dont want to know the answer to", how can we explain the sudden urge we feel about knowing everything and then feeling bad because of having "asked"?

Some time ago I had a friend who smelled very badly. And every time we were together, I promised myself not to breathe from my nose. But every time I failed. I was so tempted that I would take a small whiff and it was awful every time, no surprise. What am I trying to say? Sometimes curiosity is too strong and we do things to calm our curiosity that are not necessarily in our long-term interest

Not to any public personalities on the spot, but there is a slew of self-help books/speakers/retreats - in other words, a multi-billion dollar industry out there that operates on making people believe that they can profoundly change themselves. In my own case, personal shortcomings like procrastination for example, how likely is it that someone in her 50s can still successfully tackle these types of personal problems? In other words, is the self-help industry a hoax? Is is irrational to expect change on a deep level?

There is clearly a demand for self-help, and it is a very interesting industry. To look into this, I went to a 3-day event with Tony Robbins and one with the Landmark Forum. In each, there was some grain of scientific evidence but they were building giant castles from these grains of sand. I also saw lots of pain in these meetings, and people who were dealing with very complex problems. And it upsets me that these organizations are selling them the "answers" at such a high cost.

Hi Dan, Im wondering what you think of a lot of these referral based programs online. Since they reward people monetarily for sharing/referring friends, do you think the monetary incentive takes away from the the intrinsic motivation to share/refer someone to a product or service?

Hey Dan, on your experiment on sexual arousal and decision making, you gave your test subjects laptops in order to get sexually aroused. So my questions are, naturally- in what condition did you get the laptops back What did you do with them?

We thought about this in advance and covered them in saran wrap before giving them to participants. I should point out that it was still a bit difficult to work on these laptops knowing their history..

The relationships with different departments are very open, and I get to interact a lot with people in other departments -- Duke is an incredibly interdisciplinary place and allows for a lot of conversation between disciplines

Do you hire interns to work with you in your research? If yes, what is the best way to approach you? What qualities do you look for before hiring the intern? Do you accept undergraduate students as well? What about students not having major in Psychology or Economics?

Can you comment a little bit on the rise of behavioral economics and where you see it going in the future? And maybe its importance? I'm an economics undergrad student and the department is currently trying to hire someone to teach this side of econ. Thanks for everything by the way. Predictably Irrational really solidified my love for and interest in economics.

I am hoping that behavioral economics will become a path for applying all of social science into real decisions. I'm hoping it would take input from psychology, sociology, anthropology, philosophy, and of course economics, and impose the experimental method to test which solutions are most promising.

Hi Dan, I'm currently taking your Beginner's Guide to Irrational Behavior MOOC on Coursera. I have a couple of questions about it. 1. What has been your biggest surprise based on your MOOC experiences? 2. Have you used any of the data you collect from the MOOC in any of your papers or articles?

We haven't used the data in any papers yet, but we are doing a few studies and we will see. In terms of what has surprised me the most, I'd say it has been the incredible feeling of an international community with the students.

Just on Friday, someone offered me tickets to the world cup. And I happily took them! So I'm looking forward to examining the chaos firsthand. I've been to Brazil many times, and I mostly worry about the transportation -- but given that nothing will probably start on time and the relaxed approach that Brazilians have to schedules, it will certainly be an interesting experience.

No way!! The punishment for cheating would probably be some form of public acknowledgement such as standing in front of the class and asking the class for forgiveness. This might be followed up with their favorite a cappella Barry Manilow tune

Hi dan! I took your coursera course last year and it sparked an intense curiosity in the subject. I just finished Paul bloom's coursera course and obsessively listen to the very bad wizards podcast! I What is your take on the attack of the existence of free will using neuroscience? I fear I may have let the guys on very bad wizards impact my opinion too much and since you are the one that impacted me first, I would love to hear your views on the subject!

For me, this was an essential aspect of dishonesty because what we find is that dishonesty is all about the ability to justify our actions. When we can rationalize, we are more dishonest. And creativity is one of the basic tools to help us rationalize with greater ease -- so finding that creativity and dishonesty go hand in hand was an important piece to the puzzle.

Does the irrationality of the human mind undermine the argument for democracy? If the public is irrational, easily manipulated and can't accept the future benefits of current sacrifice, then should they be in charge?

I think it definitely shows some of the problems with democracy and some of the needs for regulation. I'm hopeful that people could make reasonable decisions from time to time when given the right structure. On top of that, if we have people who are experts they might (sometimes) be in a better position to make better decisions for the rest of us. So I believe in representative democracy that is based on professional and scientific examination of evidence, and using this evidence to make policy decisions.

Also, do you think MOOCs will disrupt higher education? If so, what are the implications for higher ed administrators to either embrace or evolve to accommodate MOOCs - or put simply, what should universities be doing now that MOOCs are becoming more mainstream (and seem to be on a path to continue to do so)?

I think there will always be a place for higher education. It will evolve, of course, and universities and professors have to figure out how to deal with the complexities that MOOCs bring. I do worry that for the sake of cheaper education we will get more homogenous, less nuanced, less thoughtful education.

I'm very interested in this emerging field of behavioral economics. I'm a junior in high school and have begun my search for colleges. Any suggestions for the best universities to study this field at the undergrad level? I know I can just double major in Econ and Psych, but are there any universities that I would be able to jump right into Behavioral Economics without having to wait until grad school? If so, what are the best ones?

It is hard, but I try to experience everything from the inside perspective and just experience the event, but also trying to see the outside view and reflect on what is going on from a more objective perspective. Overall, it is not a bad way to reflect on social evenings.

Molecular biology. There has been a huge explosion in our understanding of biology, and it's incredibly important for mankind, and I wish I could be at the forefront of both understanding what's going on and use this understanding to change the world. So, my advice to you is to be a molecular biologist.